The Line Between Genius and Insanity
by phantomviolinist
Summary: Johnlock! John Hamish Watson is the "Christine", the young ingenue ballet dancer. An ominous presence has been noticed around the Paris Opera recently, but John doesn't connect that with Sherlock Holmes, his teacher and guide. There will be cases to solve and intrigue will abound! Rated T because these are murder mysteries- non-nasty, though. Thanks to my friend Maria for the title
1. Prelude

John Watson stumbled into the men's changing room and slid into a chair. It had been a marathon ten-hour dance practice today, in preparation for the upcoming premiere of some new, mysterious work by a new, mysterious composer.

_It'll probably be uninteresting or dull_, thought John, _and all this hard work, all the late nights of extra practice with Madame Giry just to get by, they will all be unnecessary and "unimportant" because no one will come to see this new opera. It's about a cuckolded old man! How many __**hundreds **__of times has that motive been repeated? There is the cuckold, the young pretty wife, the handsome young lover, etc., etc. Variations on a theme. _

He sighed, watching the other five male dancers file in silently. _Well, at least there's a great ballet and nice music, or so it seems from the rehearsal piano. I shouldn't be depressed- I'm living my dream as a ballet dancer at the National Acadamy of Music, in Paris, and the people here are good, and…._

"John Hamish Watson!" The strident tones of Madame Giry cut into John's thoughts and roughly shook him out of his daydreams.

"What is wrong with you today? Your mind is off floating on a cloud while your feet are somewhere taking a rest on a beach! You weren't paying attention to anything you were doing!"

John knew she was right- he had often felt that his mind and his feet were in different places, especially today. Because today was the anniversary of….

His father's….

No, he wouldn't think of it. He'd put it off until tonight, when he would have nightmares about it and cry and scream silently into his thin pillow, biting his knuckles to stop the sound. And then he'd finally fall back asleep, simply to repeat the process. But not now. He wouldn't.

Right now, he'd focus on Madame Giry's voice and her honest, harsh, truthful reprimands.

"Come with me, John," she commanded, pointing towards the hallway. He miserably followed her outside and shook his head when she asked him if anything was wrong.

"Well then, more lessons tonight it is. Meet me onstage at 6:00. Is that clear? And in the meantime, get some rest, John. You are looking rather pale and tired."

He agreed to do so, simply to get her to leave. She couldn't know that if he went to sleep, it would get worse, because when he slept, he dreamed.

My authoress notes: So this is my first story, and I'm definitely going to need help. I'm guessing ten hours is a long time? Maybe it's not that long for a ballet practice, but if it's not, just substitute an appropriate number in your head. Bear with me, please! This is going to be awesome- Sherlock + POTO.


	2. Una Furtiva Lagrima

After changing from his dance clothes, he wandered around the opera house for a while, puttering around until six. He eavesdropped at his secret listening spot and smiled at Carlotta's (the leading soprano's) usual shrill demands of the manager. He made light chatter to the young, giggly ballet girls, including the very pretty but very vague Christine. He stared up and down mysterious stairways and hallways, wondering about the rumors of the opera ghost. He tried on various wigs and false mustaches and gossiped with the wigroom attendants.

Finally, it was six o'clock and he stepped onstage, feeling better.

He looked around at the empty, dim hall and wondered if it were possible for Madame Giry to be late. He sat down on the edge of the vast stage to wait, idly swinging his legs.

_Where is she? She __**did **__say six o'clock? _He pulled out his father's old, battered, cheap fob watch from his bundle of belongings on the corner of the stage. Yes, six o'clock, on the dot, it certainly was.

He smiled weakly as he remembered his father's great pride at buying the watch, though even then it had been old-fashioned and second-hand. It had been when they were touring the countryside of their native England, his father playing the violin while John danced (and sang), that he had purchased it from an old farmer who could no longer discern the numbers. He wore it every day after that and constantly used it, even when it became more battered through their travels and the numbers were nearly hidden behind a scratched and rather dirty cover, even when they left England for France with the Valerius' and he no longer needed an old timepiece because the Valerius house always had a clock, even when he started coughing, even when he died. It was a small part of his father that John had been able to keep and now he wore it everywhere, almost as a salute to his father.

_If I stare at the watch any longer, I might just cry. _

_SO! Get up, practice your dance yet again until Madame Giry comes, and don't think. That's the ticket!_

Standing up, he busily brushed off his shirt and "accidentally" wiped something off his face that certainly wasn't a tear, more like dust or some dirt.

He stretched his legs, merely as a formality and a nod to the still absent Madame Giry. He was still limber from the long practice today, but it had been drilled into his head that you _always_ stretched before you started dancing.

Now ready, he stood.

He took a breath.

He checked the stage to see if Madame Giry was there yet.

He looked for his bundle of possessions to make sure they were out of his way.

He scanned the deserted stage and seats once again, just to make sure no one was watching.

In short, John Watson did everything he could to not have to start dancing.

It was not that John hated ballet; oh no, it was much more subtle than that. He loved the music and the harmonies, but he hated the punishing routine he was forced to undergo every day just to keep both his muscle tone and his flexibility. He loathed the structured way of doing things: there was no room for improvisation or personality. He despised how dancing had become more than something he liked to do for amusement and relaxation and had now taken over his life. He couldn't do anything, couldn't treat himself after a hard performance to a warm cup of tea and a pastry, couldn't collapse onto his bed at his tiny flat after a tough rehearsal, couldn't dance to anything else, without thinking "What if this hurts my ballet?"

If he were honest with himself, he would admit that he most enjoyed (and was best at dancing) the folk dances he had learned as a child on his travels with his father. When he danced to those wild, free, almost pagan dances, he felt freedom that appealed to a part of him he usually kept hidden. But soon enough, the solid, respectable John came back and told him No.

No, don't dance to these melodies, John, because you might get confused when you "really" dance. Don't, because that feeling of freedom is wrong. Don't, because that isn't real dancing; real dancing is pain and sweat and long hours and stretching and _ronds de jambs_ and _pirouettes_ and Madame Giry pounding out the beat on the hard wooden floor of the stage and yelling, not freedom and laughter and lightness and no rules. Don't, because you're not good enough: if you can barely dance ballet, how can you _possibly _do this?

Don't sing either, though it gives you the same feeling of lightness and freedom. People might hear you and your ignorant mistakes and judge you. People might look at you with their eyes of soft, smooth silk that barely conceals the frigid hard steel underneath and though they'd say "Well done, John! We never knew you could do this! Why haven't you done this earlier?", they wouldn't mean it. What they would really mean was "Why haven't you done this earlier? Were you afraid? Did you make mistakes, like you just did in front of us? You aren't a famous tenor, though you foolishly dream about it. You are simply a middling ballet dancer."

So John hid in the solid, respectable part of himself and didn't dance his wild folk dances or sing in public. They were too far removed from the artificial world of Firmin Richard, the cantankerous but musical, and Armand Moncharmin, the tasteless but jovial, the catty microcosm of the men who ran the Opera Garnier, the universe of the managers. In this Opera, the "tasteless" sometimes won, especially in the ballet scenes, or so it seemed to John.

But when he was alone, in moments like these, he could escape and sing the operas like they were meant to be sung. He'd sing in the hallways, after checking both ends to make sure no-one was coming. He'd sing in the deserted changing room. When he sang, he could be free. One could express so much with just small differences: a trill here, a musical laugh there, a held note. It felt more pure, this idea that someone could create beauty and harmony through themselves only, without a set, without costumes, without musicians.

And now, here it was; another beautiful, golden moment of silence and peace that John would break with something close to abandon. He took a different kind of breath, the kind that filled him up so he could empty himself, pour himself into song. And he sang.

_Una furtiva lagrima, negli ochi suoi spunto… _

_Shyly and slow a tear arose, Gleaming within her eye…._

All went well until about a third of the way through. This was the tricky part- Nemorino, or whomever was singing him, held an F natural, blasted through a large crescendo into the next measure with only an eight note rest's time to breath, then vaulted up to an A flat and he could never manage to do that without either running out of breath or rushing the beat. To be able to breathe, he had to slow the tempo, but then the song dragged painfully slowly and the long note beforehand was too long for him; if he made the tempo faster, considering the long F, he had no time to breath and his magnificent A flat turned into a squeak. As the passage approached, he felt himself tense, and sure enough, he ran out of breath.

"Turn the D into a sixteenth note," a man's voice commanded.

Shocked, John wildly looked around the seemingly-empty stage and hall but he could see no one.

"Who…!"

No, that wouldn't do at all. His voice had cracked. Try again.

"Who are you? Where are you? How long have you been spying on me, watching me practice?"

Much better. Very steady. Seemingly unaffected.

The beautiful, condescending, golden voice replied, "I'll answer your terribly simple questions in exactly the opposite order you asked. I haven't been _spying _on you- that's considered terribly rude, or so I'm told. I was simply watching for mistakes, which you didn't make until that complicated passage, I might add. I have been observing for approximately 15 minutes. It doesn't matter where my body is- I can make my voice sound from anywhere. Ventriloquism, I've found, is a useful skill in deceiving others. And last, it doesn't matter who I am. I can be a demon from hell. I can be a cuckolded husband. I can be a cat, meowing from underneath a table. I can be a world-class consulting detective, which I am, the only one, if I may bring that to your attention. I can be the most famous and accomplished violinist the world has ever known. Or I can be an angel, sent by your father."

John leaped back and looked around wildly for the source of these penetrating words. "How on earth did you know that? Did someone tell you that?"

The man scoffed. "John Watson- do you mind if I shorten that to just 'Watson' in the future? Good, good. Watson, it's so obvious that it took all of three and a half seconds to deduce, and that's only because I've been up all night for the past two days and I'm tired. Here is a man who looks at an old, battered watch as if it is the most precious thing in the world, and yet is not poor enough for it to be his only 'good' accessory. And anyway, you take some pride in your appearance, so an old, rusty watch doesn't suit your character."

"It's not rusty-" John attempted, but the man continued to pontificate, disregarding him completely and talking right over him.

"Sentiment, then? Most likely family, because you're not married and probably don't have one _particular_ ballet girl that you like. The most obvious choice is father, because it's such a masculine design. One, however, mustn't omit the possibility of a mother wearing her father's watch and passing it on to her son, but on the whole…. Balance of probabilities, what with the design and the fact that you are not destitute…. Father, definitely. Is he dead or far away? You would be much more defensive if it was just a case of homesickness, because crying over Momma and Papa on the farm is less masculine than crying because of a dead parent. So, a beloved dead musician father, an absent or dead mother, great- I might even say star-worthy- vocal talent but no way to bring it out. Did I miss anything?" he concluded triumphantly.


	3. Continuo

"Wonderful!" John whispered quietly. Then, louder, "That was amazing! How do you do it?"

The man answered in an artificially bored voice that badly concealed his pride and happiness. "Commonplace, for me at least. That's how my mind works. I can't explain all my methods- it would take too long. If you were asked to prove that two and two made four, you might find some difficulty, and yet you are quite sure of the fact. So am I sure that you should be a great star, but you have locked your talent away inside of you since your father died. Madame Giry, honorable woman that she is, can't see that and thus doesn't cater her teachings to serve you. You could be great in anything you chose, including ballet, but I can see that you have poured your heart into singing. You need someone who can help. I can fill that gap. I will be your teacher."

"But… But Madame Giry… She… She was… Six o'clock…" John was taken aback by this man's arrogant statement, and he was only able to splutter some sentences while his mind worked furiously.

"Madame Giry is at home with a small case of a very curable but incapacitating strain of stomach flu and won't be with us today."

"Well, that's lucky for you, I suppose."

He chuckled darkly. "I make my own luck."

John looked up, horrified. "Did you… I mean, you… Drugged Madame Giry?!"

"As I said, she will recover from it in two days. It's nothing she can't handle and she is in no pain. She is used to such things, from me at least. And I did it for a good cause. You needed a teacher; I can help you with that. All arrogance aside, I am one of the premier experts on vocal training in France, and perhaps in the world. So, you get a teacher, I get a cure for my insufferable boredom, we both win."

John swallowed. "Agreed. But you can't drug Madame Giry any more, no matter how much she's used to it."

He could practically hear the petulant scowl in the other man's voice as he agreed, reluctantly.

"Good. Where shall we start? Oh, incidentally, what should I call you?" John asked.

There was a pause, then the man's voice came back in an attempt at casualness. "Call me whatever you like- none of them will be my true name anyway. I suppose, when I interacted with men more, they called me Sherlock Holmes. Will that do?"


	4. Continuo Part 2

John smiled. em Sherlock. A good name. Simultaneously extremely odd and melodious. Like him. /em

"So, um… How do you want to… That is… When do we start?"

Sherlock's voice had a smile in it. "We start now. Do the passage again, but like I said, cut off the D and turn it into a sixteenth note instead of an eighth. You may have heard Ubaldo Piangi "sing" it straight through- that is, blast away at a perfectly good piece of music until there's nothing left of the composer's vision- but his voice is different from yours. This way is better for you and it sounds more natural. And no, you may not teach it to the other men of the ballet or the chorus. If they cannot find the way to do this on their own or by watching you, they don't deserve to know." As he saw John hesitate, he added, "Do it. Just try it. I'm right, you know."

John went to center stage and took a deep breath from his diaphragm, playing the notes of the music in his head, only to realize that Sherlock was accompanying him on the violin. Apparently, he hadn't been lying when he'd said that he was the best in the world- he transformed the simple chords of the aria into a masterpiece, adding vibrato and crescendos to signal an increase in volume to John, and adding notes where they were needed. John realized that a great portion of the song had flown by, and he had not only sung his best ever, but he hadn't thought about the difficult passage, hadn't tensed when a particularly difficult or long note came, and most importantly, hadn't once thought of his father.

The passage approached, and John was relaxed. He cut off the D earlier than he had before, took a good breath, and the A floated out of him, gracefully and exactly like Sherlock had said it would. It was easy now- why hadn't John thought of that before? He felt a funny muscle move on his face, and realized he was smiling- no, not smiling, grinning, like he hadn't in years. The rest of the song flew by and before he knew it, before it got old, before he wanted it to end like he usually did, it was done.

"Much better. Do you believe me now, John?"

"Yes, I do. Not that I didn't before, of course, but…" John trailed off and sighed. "Forget it. Well, thank you for the lesson. Should I be here, six o'clock tomorrow?" He hoped his voice sounded more confident than he felt. Usually, he was very good at hiding his emotions, but this man saw through all that, straight to what John really felt. For heaven's sake, he'd just met Sherlock 15 minutes ago! He hadn't even seen his face! And yet he trusted him and wanted very much for these informal lessons to continue.

"Yes, I suppose we can't continue like this all night." Sherlock sighed. "And now that I've had a taste of something interesting, the boredom will return and become even more insufferable."  
John sat down, unlacing his ballet shoes.

"Incidentally, what is a consulting detective? Are you really the only one in the world?"

"Yes, of course I am. Who else has the knowledge or the inclination?"

John glanced up. The man hadn't been so careful with his voice- for the past minute, it had been coming from one particular region of the theater- the section of private boxes on the grand-tier, next to the stage-box, on the left. In particular, it seemed to be emanating from Box 5.

"What exactly does a consulting detective do?" he asked.

"Here in Paris, we have lots of government detectives and lots of private ones. When those gentlemen (and I say that in the loosest sense) are at fault, they come to me, and I manage to put them on the right scent. They lay all the evidence before me, and I am generally able, by the help of my knowledge of the history of crime, to set them straight. There is a strong family resemblance about misdeeds, and if you have all the details of a thousand at your fingertips, it is odd if you can't unravel the thousand and first. Parisian detectives come to me when they get themselves into a fog, and other people come when they are in trouble about something and want a little enlightening. I listen to their story, they listen to my comments, and then I pocket my fee."

John was surprised: he had expected only a perfunctory answer, but this was obviously something Sherlock was proud of and could talk about for hours. And he realized that he'd like that. Something about this man's comments previously had indicated a kind of resentment against the world, like when he said he'd been "told" that spying was rude- it wasn't an obvious sneer, but from him it seemed an insult at-

At whom? John didn't know.

But now Sherlock seemed happy and almost content, describing the various skills of his profession and the various ways in which he helped others. John wanted to know more.

"Do you mean that without leaving your room you can unravel some knot which others can make nothing of, though they've seen every detail for themselves?"

Sherlock snorted. "They do em not /em see every detail, thankfully for my pocketbook. I see the obvious flaws, the quite noticeable patterns that they miss, the rather apparent mistakes which a criminal nearly always makes, and for that they pay me and call me a genius. I see everything. I have a kind of intuition that way. In rare cases, a case turns up which is a little more complex. Then I have to go through the quite tedious process of sending death threats to the local constabulary to ensure they don't touch anything before I bustle out there and see things with my own eyes."

John was rather astonished. "Was that a joke? From the famous Consulting Detective, no less. I am honored to be the receiver of such a favor."

Sherlock chuckled. John shivered- the sound of Sherlock's laughter seemed to echo throughout the deserted theater, its golden tones winding around the columns and seats and immeasurably cheering it.

"Yes, it was a joke. Perhaps I shall make another, in due time."

John smiled and shook his head. This man was worse than the ballet girls for pompousness!

"Until tomorrow, then?" he said, almost reluctantly.


End file.
